[Athen] New e-reader for Cengage Brain and Cengage Unlimited users

[George Kerscher]

Hello folks,
 
Yes, Benetech and many others are testing EPUB readers and the results are
at epubtest.org
 
I have just contacted Cengage about the possibility of testing their new
reader.
 
Also at Benetech, they are testing the content from publishers to make sure
it conforms to the EPUB Accessibility standard, which is based on WCAG 2.0
 
Macmillan  is the first publisher to pass that rigorous set of tests and
receive certification. To be clear the EPUB is opened in a reading App.
And there are many available.
 
It will be interesting to see how Cengage compares on accessibility. They
have agreed to be in my session accepted for AHG. 
 
Personally, I find it hard to think that publishers will want their own
reader. As a blind user, I want to learn a Reading App inside and out and
become efficient. I would not like to learn a new reader for each book I
purchase. I will be advocating for publishers to distribute their born
accessible content through multiple sources so I can choose where to buy the
titles.

Best
George
 
From: athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> On Behalf
Of Wershing, Alice D.
Sent: Wednesday, July 24, 2019 11:10 AM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network <athen-list at u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Athen] New e-reader for Cengage Brain and Cengage Unlimited
users
 
Hello,
I wonder what Benetech will say about the accessibility of a new internal
reader.  They have been working with all of the reading systems to determine
their accessibility.   The only publisher that I'm aware of that has passed
Benetech's Accessibility program is Macmillan. 
 
Alice D. Wershing, M.Ed., A.T.P., C.P.A.C.C.
Disability Services, Technology Specialist Pellissippi State Community
College
865-694-6751
865-539-7699 (fax)
 
East TN Region Accessibility Specialist
<http://www.tnecampus.info/specialists> 
Tenessee Board of Regents-TN eCampus
 
PSCC Access for All Blog <http://blogs.pstcc.edu/access4all/> 
PSCC Accessible Format Facebook Page
<https://m.facebook.com/psccdisabilityservices>  (PSCC-Disability Services)
PSCC Access4All Twitter Feed <https://twitter.com/Access4allPSCC>
(@Access4allPSCC)
 
 
 
 
 
 
From: athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu
<mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> > On Behalf Of Susan
Kelmer
Sent: Wednesday, July 24, 2019 11:26 AM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network <athen-list at u.washington.edu
<mailto:athen-list at u.washington.edu> >
Subject: Re: [Athen] New e-reader for Cengage Brain and Cengage Unlimited
users
 
As usual, publishers are deciding how our students are to access their
materials.  This is not their job, nor their purview.
 
Publishers like to say they are listening to us.  
 
They are not.  They never have.  And this is unfortunate for our students.
 
On the plus side, none of us will be unemployed anytime soon, as there will
still be a need for us to remediate materials to fit the student's needs!
 
Susan Kelmer
Alternate Format Production Program Manager
Disability Services
University of Colorado Boulder
303-735-4836
 
 
 
From: athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu
<mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> > On Behalf Of
Deborah Armstrong
Sent: Wednesday, July 24, 2019 9:20 AM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network <athen-list at u.washington.edu
<mailto:athen-list at u.washington.edu> >
Subject: [Athen] New e-reader for Cengage Brain and Cengage Unlimited users
 
https://blog.vitalsource.com/update-for-users
This is from the VitalSource blog. Apparently Cengage is pulling many of
their textbooks off VitalSource and their new home will be an internal
e-reader.
 
My experience with students is even when an e-reader is fairly accessible,
the students want to stick with a tool they know, whether it's their Kindle,
Balabolka, K3000 or Read and Write. 
 
I'm guessing that Cengage, like Pearson is going to "certify" more and more
of their content as accessible  and encourage students to buy  a textbook in
the e-reader.
 
I have some experience with Cengage Brain, and  on the positive side, there
seems to be a "read aloud" button on every page so you can use the voice
built in to your OS to listen to that page, as long as your browser and OS
supports that. There also seems to be captioning on most of the videos for
the two courses with which I have experience.
 
On the negative side, a book that has charts, tables and similar visual
content may or may not have descriptions, and even when descriptions exist,
if the image is just a picture of text - such as a picture of a spreadsheet
or computer screen, the description won't contain the actual text.
 
--Debee
 
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